ORLANDO, Fla., April 8, 2025 /PRNewswire/ – The Sky Was on Fire: Ballet & War in Ukraine, a visceral portrait of resilience through art, will make its World Premiere at the Florida Film Festival on Wednesday, April 16, 2025, with an encore screening on April 20.
The documentary captures the powerful stories of Ukrainian ballet dancers who, in the face of Russia’s 2022 invasion, became unexpected symbols of resistance. While theaters crumbled and lives shattered, within the chaos, artists chose to fight—some with rifles, some with movement, all with unwavering spirit.
Among them was Oleksandr Shapoval, a principal dancer with the National Ballet of Ukraine, who gave up the stage to defend his country and was killed in combat. His legacy threads through the film, alongside other remarkable voices: a young ballerina arrested for protesting and later escaping imprisonment, and a stage director by day and volunteer commander by night, operating out of one of Kyiv’s last remaining theaters.
The story began in Orlando, where a local production team from Adrenaline Films was filming a ballet performance – produced by the Ginsburg Family Foundation as a fundraiser for Ukraine – when they met the dancers. What started as a one-night shoot aired nationally on PBS as Nadiya Ukraine (Suncoast Emmy winner) and evolved into a two-year journey across war-torn Ukraine to produce a feature documentary. The team followed artists at a crossroads, with some escaping to safety, others serving on the front lines, and many staying to perform in defiance of the violence around them.
Drawing visual inspiration from the groundbreaking documentary Pina, the film fuses intimate interviews with striking performance. Ballet becomes an act of protest, nowhere more vividly than in a haunting sequence where Khrystyna Shyshpor, Shapoval’s former partner and principal dancer, performs amid bombed-out rubble.
“This is about the human instinct to create in the face of devastation,” says Michael Murray, Director of Photography and Founder of Adrenaline Films. “I hope viewers walk away not only moved by the courage of these artists, but reminded of the power art has to heal, to resist, and to connect us.”
Before its festival premiere, the film held a private screening at the National Opera House of Ukraine in Kyiv on March 18—bridging Florida’s cultural community with Ukraine’s fight for artistic survival.
SOURCE Adrenaline Films
Originally published at https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-sky-was-on-fire-ballet–war-in-ukraine-to-world-premiere-at-florida-film-festival-302422587.html
Images courtesy of https://pixabay.com
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